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Metonymy (mɪˈtɒnɪmi,_-nəmi,_mɛ-) is a figure of speech in which a concept is referred to by the name of something closely associated with that thing or concept. The words metonymy and metonym come ; , a suffix that names figures of speech, . Metonymy and related figures of speech are common in everyday speech and writing. Synecdoche and metalepsis are considered specific types of metonymy. Polysemy, the capacity for a word or phrase to have multiple meanings, sometimes results from relations of metonymy. Both metonymy and metaphor involve the substitution of one term for another. In metaphor, this substitution is based on some specific analogy between two things, whereas in metonymy the substitution is based on some understood association or contiguity. American literary theorist Kenneth Burke considers metonymy as one of four "master tropes": metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, and irony. He discusses them in particular ways in his book A Grammar of Motives. Whereas Roman Jakobson argued that the fundamental dichotomy in trope was between metaphor and metonymy, Burke argues that the fundamental dichotomy is between irony and synecdoche, which he also describes as the dichotomy between dialectic and representation, or again between reduction and perspective. In addition to its use in everyday speech, metonymy is a figure of speech in some poetry and in much rhetoric. Greek and Latin scholars of rhetoric made significant contributions to the study of metonymy. Metonymy takes many different forms. Synecdoche uses a part to refer to the whole, or the whole to refer to the part. Metalepsis uses a familiar word or a phrase in a new context. For example, "lead foot" may describe a fast driver; lead is heavy, and a heavy foot on the accelerator causes a vehicle to go fast. The figure of speech is a "metonymy of a metonymy". Many cases of polysemy originate as metonyms: for example, "chicken" means the meat as well as the animal; "crown" for the object, as well as the institution.

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